The Internet has played an influential role in developing electronic commerce. Many businesses have established websites to promote their products to potential consumers. Typically, the website includes a user interface that allows consumers to select items they wish to purchase and place them into a virtual shopping cart while they continue to browse. After the consumer has completed browsing and/or selecting other items on the website and is ready to “checkout,” the consumer completes the ordering process to purchase the items. Conventionally, during the checkout phase, the website directs the consumer to another web page (e.g., a checkout page) where the consumer provides payment information. Furthermore, typically, the web site requires a user to login to the web site and/or create an account with the web site in order to complete a purchase.
By requiring a consumer to login and/or create an account with a merchant website, the checkout process can be time extensive and can provide friction between the consumer and the merchant (e.g., requiring a user to create a username, password, provide payment information, address, etc.). This is especially true with mobile devices, which present more difficulty in creating usernames and passwords. As a result, in some instances, having to login and/or create an account prior to making a purchase with the merchant website can inhibit (e.g., deter and/or prevent) purchases from the consumer. Some attempts to mediate the above issues include guest checkout services, which allow a consumer to purchase a product from a merchant website without having to create an account with the merchant website.
However, such guest checkout services fail to provide adequate solutions when dealing with software as a service (SaaS) products (e.g., products such as software licensed on a subscription basis and centrally hosted), which typically require login credentials (e.g., an account and/or authentication) to operate and use the SaaS products. Additionally, such SaaS products conventionally require an account with the merchant system providing (e.g., hosting) the SaaS products, which guest checkout services do not require. Furthermore, the merchants providing such SaaS products typically require email verification to determine correct pricing, corporate accounts, shared licenses, permissions, etc. that guest checkout services do not require.
Accordingly, these and other disadvantages exist with respect to conventional systems.